


The Gift

by Noivian



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Handplates (Undertale), Gaster needs Therapy, Gen, Nova is not qualified to give Therapy, Presents being used as a metaphor for love, Unintentional insults
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28331649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Noivian/pseuds/Noivian
Summary: A year after the barrier was broken, and six months after Gaster is saved from the Void, a gift is given.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	The Gift

The air was cold and biting as Nova stepped outside onto the back porch. Her nose and ears immediately began to redden from the chill, and she lightly kicked the snow away as she made her way to the wooden railing where a certain skeleton was leaning. Gaster took a long drag of the cigarette between his fingers, exhaling a long plume of smoke up into the night sky. A couple stars managed to make their way through the darkness, twinkling despite everything. He leaned on his elbows against the railing, and seemed lost in thought as Nova approached. She’d made sure to come up on the side that didn’t have a broken socket, not wanting to spook him again like the last time. 

He didn’t even turn to acknowledge her presence, and briefly Nova wondered if she should just leave the wrapped box in her hands and return inside. Her gaze turned to the sliding glass door, and the festivities happening beyond that - Sans was asleep on the couch while Papyrus helped Toriel put leftover dinner into plastic containers, Undyne and Alphys snuggled under a blanket while watching a new anime that Alphys had gotten for Christmas. All in all, it looked like a good time. Nova had only brought the thinner inner jacket she wore, so standing out there in the snow was starting to become much more chilly than expected. 

A flash of movement caught her eye, and she turned back in time to see the end of his signing, spectral blue hands making the motion for “want”. She could only assume he was asking why she was out here. 

“I got you a present,” Nova stated, turning to offer the box in her hand, gingerly wrapped in red and green paper, a bow stuck on top. 

“I don’t want it,” the floating hands signed, as supposedly the same sentence came out his mouth, though Nova had no clue what was actually being said beneath all that modem dial-up noise.  Nova’s face fell to what Alphys would describe as a ‘deadpan’. Her tentative smile fell to a dissatisfied frown. It was frustrating when he kept refusing, despite her never giving him a reason to distrust her.

“No, you don’t want it,” she sighed, turning to lean her back against the railing and letting her arms drop, present still in hand. “You don’t want any sympathy, or pity, and certainly not any help, even when it’s obvious you need it. You don’t want to let anyone in for fear of losing them again. You don’t want to fail again. You don’t want to trust humans, because you don’t want us turning around and killing any more of the people you care for. I get it.”

Through her little speech, Gaster had turned to look at her, some mixture of anger, befuddlement, and offense on his face. But based on his silence, she knew that not only had she hit a nerve and overstepped her bounds, but she’d also found a nugget of truth in that. “I’m sorry; that was too far.”

The bony scientist shot her a sharp glare, and turned away, but didn’t make a motion to move. Nova sighed and looked down to her hands again. Where was she going with this? There was a conclusion she wanted to come to. “Pain and love can’t exist without each other - we’d have no frame of reference for pain if we didn’t put ourselves in a position to love one another, just as we wouldn’t value love if we didn’t know pain. They aren’t mutually exclusive. And as much as you like to push people away, be aware that in doing so, you’re causing them more pain than if you’d just let them in.” She looked up Gaster again - he wasn’t moving away, so that meant he was listening... right? 

“Opening up is hard, I know, especially when you fear disappointing someone. It’s embarrassing and it’s painful, but if the people around you truly care, they’ll be there for you. Just as you’d be there for them if the reverse were true.” She stood from her lean against the railing, shuffling her feet a bit to warm them up. “So maybe you don’t want my gift. Maybe you don’t care about me one bit. But you care about them, and they care about you.” Inside the house, Papyrus had come about the couch to tell Sans off for sleeping when he should be paying attention or socializing... or something. The sound was rather muffled from the outside. Nova gave a side glance to Gaster, watching him look over his shoulder at the others inside.

“I’m not gonna sit here and tell you what to do with your life or who you should care about, but do consider my words, for what they’re worth. Not all gifts can be refused.” Brushing off the snow on the wooden railing, she gingerly balanced the present on the railing and went back inside, the glass door sliding closed behind her, leaving Gaster out alone in the snow.

Another long puff of smoke billowed into the air, and Gaster flicked the used cigarette butt out into the thick snow covering the backyard. He stared at the box and its careful wrapping for a good long time before deciding to pick it up, looking it over. A small tag he hadn’t noticed before, tapped to the outside near the bow, had a space for writing the name of the intended recipient. There, on the tag, was his name, written sloppily in his font. A sincere gesture on Nova’s part, and Gaster couldn’t help the slight quirk of a smile. He told himself it was out of contempt. 

The wrapping was carefully torn off, revealing a simple grey box beneath with a lid. There, sitting in the box under a small pile of grey tissue paper, was a white scarf with navy and cyan bone patterns on it. He realized with a sudden shock that it had to have been custom ordered - humans didn’t just make bone patterned clothing unless it was Halloween. But this was definitely a winter scarf; it was made of wool. A heavy feeling gripped his SOUL...

After a while, Gaster stepped back inside wordlessly, smelling of cigarette smoke and snow, a certain scarf wrapped around his neck. 

**Author's Note:**

> I initially wanted to draw this in a short comic, but it occurred to me that if I attempted to draw this, it wouldn't be complete until long after New Year's. That being said, I really had hoped this ficlet was going to be longer. After getting through the first few paragraphs, it occurred to me that I'd written myself into a corner, so I had to delete it all and start over, and a lot of the tact and finesse I was going to write this with got lost in the process. I'll probably go back later and add all kinds of more interesting descriptions, but for now this is what I have. 
> 
> I was also initially going to gift this ficlet to Zarla for the holidays, but I don't think it's good enough...


End file.
